Current Launch v2 - A new instrument platform by Minimal Audio

[jbraner]

If I create a preset that uses a sample that isn't part of the factory set:

I'm not sure we're even sure what's in the factory set and what's not

[cb8rwh]

Fair point

[zvenx]

I think, emphasis on think, anything with a tick is a factory set.
the ones with AA are all access plans except some of those in the AA are part of factory.

Like in my two screenshots, those hilited with rectangles are AA but some of their components are from Factory.
Really not clear cut at all.
rsp

[cb8rwh]

Yeah I think you are correct. So when you are creating presets and browsing the 'Stream' there is a little icon to click on, which will then only show your owned sounds/wavetables.

I could just stick to those to be certain, but if I have access to everything now I wonder what happens when other people that don't have All Access try to open them. I guess there is only one way to find out.

[gaggle of hermits]

I'm on the RTO so have no way to test this but this is what the site says for perpetual owners:

Own Current today. Current's perpetual license includes a diverse suite of factory content including 340+ presets, 180+ wavetables, and 160+ sounds. Perpetual owners also receive a free year of Current All
Access, which includes unlimited in-app downloads from expansion packs, and instant access to all of Current's effects as individual plugins as they're available.

the implication there is whatever you download you keep, though it then goes on to talk about the plugins which we know need to be bought explicitly if you're not on the RTO. they could afford to be a lot less ambiguous about all this.

I think worst case is that the synth locks with the preset once the sub is up and you then either dump it or buy the preset or wavetable loopcloud-style on the $5/mo Stream deal. however, only samples are priced in terms of credits there. for presets it just says "available in current".

this might be because they expect to work it out closer to the point that people start buying out the perpetual licences come November/December or it is the case that whatever you download you keep on the basis that trying to do paid-DLC on presets is a major PITA and that the blurb for the perpetual licence is correct for what happens once all-access is over (and you've bought the synth but nothing else).

but, like I say, minimal needs to be a lot clearer about how this is meant to work because this decoding of short bits of sales blurb feels only one step removed from reading chicken entrails.

[Ou_Tis]

I'm on the RTO so have no way to test this but this is what the site says for perpetual owners:

Own Current today. Current's perpetual license includes a diverse suite of factory content including 340+ presets, 180+ wavetables, and 160+ sounds. Perpetual owners also receive a free year of Current All
Access, which includes unlimited in-app downloads from expansion packs, and instant access to all of Current's effects as individual plugins as they're available.

the implication there is whatever you download you keep, though it then goes on to talk about the plugins which we know need to be bought explicitly if you're not on the RTO. they could afford to be a lot less ambiguous about all this.

I think worst case is that the synth locks with the preset once the sub is up and you then either dump it or buy the preset or wavetable loopcloud-style on the $5/mo Stream deal. however, only samples are priced in terms of credits there. for presets it just says "available in current".

this might be because they expect to work it out closer to the point that people start buying out the perpetual licences come November/December or it is the case that whatever you download you keep on the basis that trying to do paid-DLC on presets is a major PITA and that the blurb for the perpetual licence is correct for what happens once all-access is over (and you've bought the synth but nothing else).

but, like I say, minimal needs to be a lot clearer about how this is meant to work because this decoding of short bits of sales blurb feels only one step removed from reading chicken entrails.

Minimal Audio partially answered this before:

One more question (sorry for the rapid fire)...

If I use a preset from AA, modify it and save it as my own user preset...
Is this user preset still 100% working, useable and tweakable in future even without AA or does it not work anymore because of using i.e. an wavetable from an AA pack??

This works.

If someone tries to like -- resave all the presets and steal everything that would be concerning and also a lot of work to save $15, but as part of a regular creative process we want to support this.

I'm toying with purchasing a perpetual license, just put off by the limited number of usable presets. Would be good to see the factory library increased with far more diversity without having to purchase future packs.

Fair enough, to be transparent, when we have more packs up, I will probably re-jigger the factory content to contain a spread of presets across various packs -- or ideally, I think it would be cool to allow people to pick X amount of presets themselves. When we have that change setup, I'd be happy to allow people to swap to the new factory content.

We have a lot of unreleased presets, if anything the biggest bottle neck for us right now is just how much we have to get out the door so quickly. 4 more plugins, >1k new presets, and 3 more in progress effects, plus updates and our need to continue to refine the webpage and attempt to overcome the initial launch.

But -- we shall get through it, and then we have even larger plans : )

If they let us pick our own factory presets and there are enough I like I'll be very interested... if they also add a better reverb I'll probably buy it. Maybe I'll start the trial this November, after the year of all access has already expired for some people and the terms have been decided on.

[fisherKing]

i have enough excellent reverb plugins that i am happy to use them, because the rest-of current works well. still, i hope they improve this in an update....

[jbraner]

So, end result is - nobody knows, and I think Minimal are probably still making it up. So it's hardly worth guessing

[Razzia]

Does this synth have an undo button hidden somewhere and I'm just blind? I'm pretty sure I saw someone from Minimal saying current works with host undo and redo but it doesn't work for me in Ableton Live 11.3.20/Win 10.

I mean this thread is 30 pages long and I haven't read every single comment, but I imagine if nobody could undo there'd be a lot of complaining about it so maybe it's just my computer/DAW?

[swilow11]

I haven't found an undo. Host undo in at least one rather shitty situation involved undoing the actual instantiation of Current

I'm just going to join the confused masses here. It's just not clear what happens if, as a RTO All Access user, I download some non-factory samples and use them in a custom preset. After a year, I stop my RTO and I purchase Current itself, is the sample in my preset somehow locked from editing? Is the entire preset? Or just the sample editor? Or does the sample vanish from my preset?

"Current All Access, which includes unlimited in-app downloads from expansion packs". Does this mean the expansion pack downloads are owned after the point one is no longer on All Access but has purchased a perpetual license, or are they only owned by perpetual owners who used the free year of All Access?

Honestly, the confusion here has made me simply build my own presets using what I assume are factory sounds, or try another synth first. I assumed I would gain clarity into these concerns after using the synth and getting to understand the browser, etc. but I haven't. Still, I only really blame my GAS and eagerness to play with a new sexy monster.

I also RTO Phase Plant and messaged them a while back just asking whether buying Phase Plant on sale would create any issues for the RTO instances of PP I used and support literally answered all the above concerns without me asking because most semi serious music producers aren't just concerned about their tracks in the present but also the components that comprise them into the future. Minimal Audio have changed their business model so rapidly and I truly think they haven't yet been able to assuage these fundamental and basic concerns because they don't yet really know the answers. Time will tell. It's annoying because Current is a fun synth but I'm hesitant to really create a future sunk cost by using things that I cannot know I'll have to pay for or not to continue using.

Most of this thread is about the business model and not the synth. That should be concerning.

[Greenstorm33]

I also RTO Phase Plant and messaged them a while back just asking whether buying Phase Plant on sale would create any issues for the RTO instances of PP I used and support literally answered all the above concerns without me asking because most semi serious music producers aren't just concerned about their tracks in the present but also the components that comprise them into the future. Minimal Audio have changed their business model so rapidly and I truly think they haven't yet been able to assuage these fundamental and basic concerns because they don't yet really know the answers. Time will tell. It's annoying because Current is a fun synth but I'm hesitant to really create a future sunk cost by using things that I cannot know I'll have to pay for or not to continue using.

Out of curiousity, how does Kilohearts handle PP expansions when you change from the subscription to permanent licenses? I can't think of any way to handle users gaming the system w.r.t. preset content that wouldn't be a huge detriment to legit users. The same goes for samples, which are easy to just sample out of the synth and copy back in. I feel like these issues are just inherent to offering this type of monetization scheme for a synth that is fully editable and supports importing user-generated content.

[swilow11]

^AFAIK, the PP expansions are not owned, I'm actually unsure because I stayed on RTO but suspect they'd be playable but not tweakable as will all the add-ons like Snapheap, Convolver, etc if you dont own them. The biggest difference though is that with PP it's crystal clear when a sound or whatever is from an expansion and not factory. From my end, I don't use any of those because I don't want to buy them.

I'm actually not convinced it's an issue to reshape or Tweak an expansion preset to make it your own and save it. It was a bit iffy for the Minimal Audio guy to describe such a process as stealing. What if i just copy a preset? It would be strange to do that to all expansion pack sounds though.

[Greenstorm33]

That's what I was thinking. If you somehow watermark the expansion presets and I start with one but tweak it beyond recognition, it seems unfair to have it become read-only. But from a data standpoint that process is no different than slightly modifying a paid preset for use after your sub expires.

There's a reason Splice gives you a perpetual license for anything you download. Once you've got the samples there's no taking them back, and trying to enforce more restrictive licensing terms would be totally impractical.

[Jac459]

That's what I was thinking. If you somehow watermark the expansion presets and I start with one but tweak it beyond recognition, it seems unfair to have it become read-only. But from a data standpoint that process is no different than slightly modifying a paid preset for use after your sub expires.

There's a reason Splice gives you a perpetual license for anything you download. Once you've got the samples there's no taking them back, and trying to enforce more restrictive licensing terms would be totally impractical.

I think remembering minimal audio stating something similar to splice approach. Meaning once downloaded and modified it is yours .. it was a view dozen pages back though ...

But to be honest I am generally surprised by this discussion as presets are the less sexy stuff in Current. Do U happen to like them? I have hard time on my side. I find them very much "in your face", not particularly good sounding and not practical. Maybe they are good for some genre I don't know?

[Greenstorm33]

That's what I was thinking. If you somehow watermark the expansion presets and I start with one but tweak it beyond recognition, it seems unfair to have it become read-only. But from a data standpoint that process is no different than slightly modifying a paid preset for use after your sub expires.

There's a reason Splice gives you a perpetual license for anything you download. Once you've got the samples there's no taking them back, and trying to enforce more restrictive licensing terms would be totally impractical.

I think remembering minimal audio stating something similar to splice approach. Meaning once downloaded and modified it is yours .. it was a view dozen pages back though ...

But to be honest I am generally surprised by this discussion as presets are the less sexy stuff in Current. Do U happen to like them? I have hard time on my side. I find them very much "in your face", not particularly good sounding and not practical. Maybe they are good for some genre I don't know?

I don't particularly care for them either. I'm hoping they release some that are more practical to actually incorporate into a track.